Thom Loverro: Detwiler shows his ace potential

This is what the Washington Nationals have been selling since the Lerner family and Stan Kasten bought the team and took over the operation in the middle of 2006 - the hope of a better day, the dreams of the future, the potential of a baseball player.

Faith.

It is the currency of survival for front office executives - young players who are signed every year through the amateur draft and then touted as the hope of the future. They are all future 20-game winners or 50 home run guys when a team drafts these young men out of high schools and colleges.

Faith is hanging on by a thread in NatsTown these days after a 102-loss season in the new ballpark last year and 26 losses - many of them embarrassing ones - so far in this campaign. If people are still believing, they are believing at home, based on the empty seats at Nationals Park.

For those true believers who came to the ballpark Monday night - and who weren’t Pittsburgh Pirates fans - they were rewarded for their faith. They got a look at the future in the shape of Ross Detwiler, and it looks promising.

Detwiler looked to be every bit the No. 1 pick the Nationals promised to their fans when they selected him in the first round of the 2007 amateur draft and offered a glimmer of hope, dreams and potential all realized on a cool night in May - even surrounded by the futility that has become the identity of this year’s Nationals team.

Detwiler’s teammates did all they could to initiate the first-time starter to the Washington Misfits by committing three errors while he was on the mound, including two in the first inning on ground balls by shortstop Cristian Guzman.

But Detwiler has a different identity. He is part of the Nationals’ future.

That team is the Washington Aces.

Jordan Zimmermann. Shairon Martis. John Lannan.

Stephen Strasburg?

Ross Detwiler.

The kid from Wentzville, Mo., stayed composed in that first inning after the errors by Guzman put runners at first and second with two outs. Detwiler got Adam LaRoche to hit a foul pop to Ryan Zimmerman at third to close out the inning. And when Craig Monroe hit a three-run home run in the third inning following another error, this one by first baseman Nick Johnson on a pickoff attempt, Detwiler remained in control and closed out the inning without any more damage.

When he left after five innings, Detwiler had allowed two earned runs, struck out six, walked none and threw 61 strikes out of 84 pitches, mixing up his pitches and changing speeds. And in the fifth, the Nationals at least were kind enough to let the kid off the hook from the loss, scoring five runs on home runs by Zimmerman and Johnson to take a 5-3 lead.

This isn’t the future, though. This is here and now, and in the here and now the bullpen will blow the lead, as it did after Detwiler was gone, with five Pittsburgh runs in the sixth inning off Garrett Mock and Jesus Colome. It was yet another test of faith for fans who have suffered enough.

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